It's all just a game of thieves
by thisbitch-isback
Summary: The first time Hardison when on an actual job with Gwen Raiden
1. Chapter 1

Hardison stood on the rooftop, pulling the harness straps cautiously, testing their strength.

"Will you leave them alone?" Gwen said exasperatedly, "Seriously what is up with you tonight?"

He looked over at her with an 'are you insane?' look on his face. " I ain't so sure about this now, Gwen."

She arches an eyebrow. "How many years have you known me, Alec? Have you ever known me to fall? Like, ever?"

"No.." He replied, sighing.

"So what's the problem?" She was arranging her own harness as she spoke to him and fed the cable through the rig.

Hardison folded his arms across his chest leaning over a little to look over the edge of the skyscraper. "I remembered gravity and the squishiness of my manly parts."

Gwen rolled her eyes and put her hand on his back in comfort "Don't sweat it you big baby." She said mockingly as she pushed him off the building, angel diving down after him, the controls for the rig in her hand.

Hardison squealed like a girl as he fell the ten storeys he passed before Gwen halted his feed of cable when he reached the floor they wanted. "Dammit Gwen! Why'd you do that!" He was panting, half from the shock of free falling that far and half from the adrenaline rush.

"'Cause it was funny." She laughed, pulling the glass cutter out of the bag on her shoulder and starting to cut a hole in the glass.

"No it wasn't. I could have _died!_" He put his hand on his chest over his heart.

She rolled her eyes, "Don't be such a drama queen, Alec. You're perfectly safe, I made the rig myself."

"My point exactly! It hasn't had quality testing."

"Yes it has... Just now." She smirked, now halfway through cutting the neat round hole.

Hardison's eyes widened in shock. "You hadn't tested it? Are you trying to kill me?"

"Relax, I knew it was at _least_ 95% okay to go."

"Ni- ninety-five? _Just _ ninety-five?" He was starting to freak out now. He was on an untested rig, hanging another 40 storeys from the ground.

"Alec. Calm down. You designed the rig yourself, you dolt." She finished cutting the glass and leaned over to get the suction cup out of Hardison's bag, attaching it to the window.

"I-I did?... When was this?"

She laughed pulling lightly on the suction cup and pulling the piece of glass away from the rest of the window, attaching a second suction cup to the rest of the window and hooking the cut piece to it.

"About two months ago. I made you do it while you were watching Naruto."

Hardison frowned at her. "You did? That's cheating Gwen, you can't ask me to do anything while I'm watching Naruto." He folded his arms again, looking a little ridiculous hanging in mid-air.

She shrugged at him, looking in the window checking for motion detectors, she spots one on the window sill and slowly pulls her sleek long glove of one hand.

Seeing what she was doing, Hardison tried to move away. "Hey now, Sparky. Chill and put your glove back on."

She laughed again, slipping her arm through the hole and frying the detector, subsequently causing the entire network to shut down. "Do you wanna get caught? I'm pretty sure you don't want to have jumped ten storeys just to get arrested?"

"Okay, you have a point. Just, next time, warn me when you do that."

Gwen smirks as she slips her glove back on, "Where's the fun in that?"

Leaning forward, Gwen puts her hands through the hole and onto the inner windowsill, leans in more into a forward rolling somersault and hitting a button on her harness, unclipping her harness from the cable.

Hardison watches her, intrigued, he'd been her tech guy on the job for a few years but had never actually _seen_ her work.

After having to ask her to help _him_ this time, she'd insisted that he accompany her while she did it.

She called from inside, "You coming?"

Hardison took a deep breath and leaned into the hole, attempting to slip through the window in a front roll but misjudges it falling through the window and landing on the floor in a heap at Gwen's feet.

Gwen looked down at him laughing, "You okay, Alec?"

He looked up at her and glared a little, "Just peachy." He stood up slowly and rubbed his elbow. "I think I hit something."

"As long as it's not your head, I'm not interested." She turned away from him and started towards the door of the office they had dropped into.

"So I get no sympathy either?" He whined as he followed after her.

"Nope, I told you this is a dangerous job. I'm not gonna rub your elbow better." Gwen had reached the door and cracked it open a little as two armed guards passed by. She silently closed the door and placed a hand over Hardison's mouth as he started answering her back.

Hardison glared down at her and she pointed to the door. He pulled her hand off his mouth and whispered "You could have just said 'shhh'."

Gwen gave him a 'Really?' look and pulls the door open again. The guards had gone, and she opened the door completely. "Okay, we need to go down the service elevator shaft on the other side of the building."

He looked at her like she was insane, "On the other side of the building? If it's on the other side of the building why didn't we jump down the other side of the building?"

"Because, there's a meeting on the other side of the building. Even I can't get past a room full of suits." Gwen rolls her eyes and leaves the room stealthily, keeping to the walls and checking for more guards.

It took Hardison a few moment to realise he was standing in the office alone and he quickly followed Gwen, who was now nearly at the end of the corridor, and hisses in her ear when he reaches her. " You could have told me move, you know."

She snorts as they reach the service elevator, "Nah, it's more entertaining to see you panic."

"You're evil, that's what you are. Evil." He pointed to her as he spoke.

"Yeah, yeah. I've heard it all before." She smiled as she pointed to the elevator doors. "You, need to pull those open."

Hardison looked from her to the doors and back at her and laughed until he saw the serious look on her face. "Y-you're serious? Gwen, I'm nowhere near strong enough to pull those things open."

She arched a brow at him, "Oh, really? So why was it that, that one time I broke into your apartment because you didn't answer the door. I saw some massive guns on you as you walked out of the shower?"

Hardison opens his mouth to say something than shuts it, glaring at her and steps in front of the elevator, placing his hands where the doors met and getting a firm grip before starting to pull them apart.

Leaning back against the wall, Gwen watches Hardison's arms bulge under his shirt from the strain and smirks. She could have just fried the door controls but this way she got a nice view too.

Once the doors were open Hardison looked down the elevator shaft. "We're not going down that, Gwen. Nu-uh, I refuse."

Gwen pushed herself off the wall and stood next to him, "We kinda are. You have no say in the matter." As she spoke she attached them to the cable quickly and pushed him out.

Hardison, cried out in surprise then looked around confused when he didn't go anywhere, just hanging from the elevator cable.

Gwen jumps out after him and grins at the look of confusion on his face. "Something the matter, Alec? I thought you wanted warning before I drop you anywhere?"

He narrowed his eyes at her but nodded, "Fine, but I still think you're doing this on purpose."

She smirked at him and tried to look innocent, "I have no idea what you're talking about." She pushed a button on the controls and started lowering them slowly. "Going down..."


	2. Chapter 2

After a few minutes they landed on the roof of the elevator where it had been locked into position for the night. Gwen unhooked them from the cable and bent down to open the service hatch in the roof, dropping down into the elevator when she found it.

Hardison looked down at her through the hole, bemused. "Something tells me you're just getting me back for all those tests I ran on you." He'd run a number of tests on Gwen after she had explained to him that she was a freak. He had taken it as an opportunity to try out new equipment too ad by the third hour of vigorous testing Gwen had gotten sick of being prodded.

Gwen looked up at him with a faux innocent smile, "No, why would I do that? Those tests had been _so_ helpful." She pulled a glove off again and placed her hand on the controls, frying them and causing the doors to open than she looked back up at Hardison as she put her glove back on. " You coming or not?"

" Yeah, I'm coming." He said with a bit of a whine in his voice. Grabbing hold of the opening he swung down into the elevator and landed on his feet next to Gwen and smile triumphantly. " I should be a gymnast."

Gwen rolled her eyes and tried to keep the smile off her face, he'd impressed her. Not a lot of men could do that and it was nice. "Yeah, you should be in the olympics or something." She stepped out of the elevator and started striding purposefully down the corridor.

Hardison sighed when he saw her already halfway down the corridor and grumble to himself. "Nice of you to wait for me, Gwen. It's not like I do this kinda thing a lot. I'm the tech guy, not the thief."

Rolling his own eyes he jogged out after her, only to bump straight into her back when she stopped suddenly at what looked like a steel vault door. "Ow. What the hell?" He said as he rubbed his shoulder. "Girl, you're too skinny. You're just skin and bone. It hurts."

Gwen didn't listen she was too busy inspecting the door and deciding on the best course of action to get it open. "Hand me the ear piece out of your bag." She practically demanded, holding her hand out to him.

Hardison raised an eyebrow but did as he was told. The determination in Gwen's eyes was a little disturbing and he didn't want to get on the bad side of her electro hands.

Kneeling on the floor, Gwen put the suction cup end of the earpiece on the door by the combination lock and the other end in her ear as she started turning the dial.

Hardison soon got impatient and started looking up and down the corridor nervously. "Are you done yet, Sparky? I really don't wanna get arrested for this... But it would be completely worth it." He said with a small smile.

Gwen shot him a death glare. "If you shut up, I would be done. I can't hear the clicks if you don't keep quiet." She hissed.

Hardison raised his hands in surrender and pulled his phone out of his pocket, quickly hacking into the security system and checking there weren't any nasty surprises.

Just as Gwen turned the dial the for the final time and swung the door open, his phone beeped. "Uh, Gwen. There's a laser grind in there. Not to mention that the floor is pressure activated."

He taped a code into his phone and it flashed red saying access denied. "I can't override it.. We can't get in there."

She stood up and smirked at him, dropping her bag to the floor after taking out an aerosol can. "You mean, you can't. I, on the other hand, can." She said, laughter in her voice as she sprayed the aerosol into the narrow hallway behind the vault door, the green laser beams came into view and Hardison gaped at her.

"You can't be serious?" He asked seriously. "Y-you can't do that, it's suici-."

The rest of his sentence was cut off as Gwen took a few steps back, throwing the now empty aerosol can on the floor, smirked at him and started flipping through all the lasers.

Gwen could never resist a chance to show off, she could have fried the grid but this was more fun and it shut Hardison up for a while.

Hardison shook his head in disbelief, "She did it." He watched her as she landed gracefully on the other side of the grind and called out to her. "The floor in front of you is pressure activated, and pressure that lasts longer than 0.3 seconds will set of the alarms.

Gwen nodded and looked around her for a way to get over to where the object she was after was sitting on a podium. She spotted a steel beam running down the centre of the room and smiled, glancing back at Hardison over her shoulder. "It's cool, I found my way across.."

Hardison opened his mouth to tell her she was crazy if she thought that would work, but before he the chance to say a word she had already jumped up and grabbed a hold of the beam, swung her legs up and was doing a very good impression of Lara Croft.

Gwen shimmed along the beam effortlessly to the podium, completely aware the Hardison was watching her every move. Once she was above the podium she let go of the beam and hung in mid-air by her legs.

Hardison's heart skipped a beat when he saw her let go and he almost stepped forward into the lasers until he saw what she was doing. "Girl's gonna give me a heart attack someday." He murmured as he checked the security cameras on his phone.

As she hung over the podium, Gwen could get a good look at what it was she was liberating from this corporation. From what she could tell, it was a flash drive. She shrugged and stretched her arm out, her fingers closing around it and she picked it up, tucked it in her pocket and swung her upper body back up to grab a hold of the beam again.

As she started moving back towards him Hardison's eyes widened at what he saw on his phone. "Uh-oh." He looked up at Gwen, still making her way back and called out. "I don't mean to rush you Sparky, but we have company on the way."

Gwen landed at the other end of the corridor and turned to the laser grind before her. "How many?" She asked as she planned her route through the beams.

"Four, maybe five." Hardison replied as he kept looking at the screen on his phone. Gwen was already halfway through the lasers and he knew she was safe and there was no need to worry about that. "They're on their way and they're armed."

Gwen landed next to him and snatched the phone from his hand. " Okay, handguns; nothing too difficult about those. The guards themselves though.. Not so much." She winced at how organised they were as the marched towards them, a couple of corridors away.

Hardison looked between the screen and Gwen a couple of times. "What? What about the guards?" He asked, panicked.

She raised her eyebrows as the guards come closer, "Ex military.. We're gonna have to fight our way out of here." She said, handing his phone back.

Hardison did a double take. "We, what? Gwen, I'm not fighting my way out of a secure building."

Gwen shrugged at him as she took the hairband from around her wrist and tied her hair in a plait. "Suit yourself, I'm not visiting you in prison." She smirked knowing that he'd see her view if she pointed out what his way would get them.

Sighing Hardison agreed, "Okay, fine. How're we gonna do this?" He asked looking away from his phone for the first time since he noticed the guards coming.

"You're bait." She grinned as she jumped up and grabbed the pipe over head and wrapped her legs around it.

Hardison laughed, "I know you did not just call me 'bait', Gwen. I ain't nobody's bait."

Rolling her eyes, Gwen got a better grip on the pipe and listened for the sound of foot steps down the hall. "They're just around the corner, you're bait, deal with it. You're capable of pretending to get caught by accident when you're doing it on purpose."

He scowled at her. "When we get out of here, we're having a serious talk about the way you handle jobs." He replied, as he walked back to the open door of the vault and placed his hands on it ready to look like he was closing it when the guards arrived.

Still listening to the foot steps, Gwen held up three fingers as they got closer, then two, then one.

The guards rounded the corner just as Hardison started pushing the vault door closed. "Freeze!" One of the guards shouted to him, gun raised.

Hardison raised his hands in the air and turned to face them. "Did y'all know that this door was left wide open? That's a major security breach, don't you think?" He could act, he knew he could. What he didn't know was whether or not he could act badly.

The guards approached him slowly, walking under where Gwen was hanging from the pipe. "Sir, step away from the vault. You're trespassing in a secure building. We need you to come with us." The guard spoke with what was obviously a practised air of authority.

"See, I don't think you understand. I'm just helping you out and closing the door. You don't wanna be focusing on me." Hardison said matter of factly, lowering his arms and folding them across his chest. "You want to look out for my partner."

As soon as the words were out of Hardsion's mouth, Gwen let go of the pipe and hung from it with just her legs and smacked the heads of the two guards closest to her, together knocking them out.

The guard in charge had now reached Hardison and had his gun aimed as his forhead, "Hands back in the air." He growled.

Rolling his eyes Hardsion slowly started putting his hands in the air, as the last second he hit out with his right elbow, connecting with the guard's nose.

As the guard stumbled back, a hand to his now bleeding nose, Hardison shrugged at him. "Sorry. Survival of the fittest and all that."

Gwen swung down from the pipe, landing gracefully next to the two unconscious guards and tapped the next one on the shoulder as he went to help his superior.

"Hey. You wouldn't hit a girl would you?" She smiled innocently until he pulled his arm back and punched out.

Gwen leaned back, the guard's fist just inches from her face and she grabbed it as she stood back up. "Oh, so you would hit a girl." She said surprised, her eyebrows raised as she turned with his arm pinning it against his back, and shoved him against the wall.

"Just so you know? This girl fights back." She smirked as she hit his head against the wall and knocked him unconscious. "Three down, big one to go." She said the boredom evident in her voice.

While Gwen had been seeing to the guard, Hardison had been ducking and dodging the punches being thrown by the superior guard.

As the guard threw a left hook, Hardison took it as an opening and kicked him in the balls and smirked as he hit the ground, curling up into a ball.

"You forgot the number one rule of being a dude; always protect the crown jewels." Laughing, Hardison turned to see Gwen with her fist pulled back ready to hit the guard before he had. "I took care of it." He grinned as he picked up his bag and swung it onto his shoulder and headed to the stairs.

Gwen put her fist down, staring at the guard on the floor with amusement and picked her own bag up as she walked back to the service elevator, jumped up and climbed out of the service hatch and reattached herself to the cable. She pushed a button on the controls and she moved up the shaft quickly.

Hardison stood at the doors to the elevator shaft when she arrived and looked at her in disbelief. "You do know there are stairs, right?" He asked.

Swinging out of the elevator shaft and unclipping herself she nodded. "I know, I just prefer wires."

"Unbelievable." He muttered, as he walked back to the office they entered through.

"What?" Gwen frowned at his back as she followed him. "I like wires, they're like my comfort zone."

Hardison shook his head. "I know too many crazy people." He attached himself to the rig when he reached the window.

"I'm not crazy. I just love my job." She replied as she attached her own harness to the cable.

"If you say so." Hardsion smirked as he climbed out of the hole in the window and waited for her to follow him.

Gwen didn't dignify that with an answer as she followed him.

"Shut up and hold tight." She said once she was hanging next to him and pushed the button for the rig to pull them back up the side of the building.

A little while later Gwen and Hardison climbed into the back of Lucille. Hardison immediately turned his attention to the computer screens as she took a seat and watched him, helping herself to his orange soda.

"Girl, you better put my orange soda down." He said without turning around.

Gwen frowned at him but drank from the bottle anyway. "How'd you know I had it?" She pulled the flash drive out of her pocket and held it up to the light.

Turning in his seat, Hardison took the drive from her and gestured around the van. "I have eyes everywhere." He smiled, turning back to the computers and plugging the flash drive in.

"That's just creepy. Bugging your own van." Gwen replied as she sat forward, curious as to what was on the drive they had stolen.

"Not creepy, cautious." He said as he opened the file and the screen was filled with cartoon police cars.

Gwen narrowed her eyes at the screen as the word 'Catwoman' came up. "A game? You had me steal a freaking game?"

Hardison turned to look at her, mock offended. "It's not just any game. It's _Catwoman_. You can rob a bank in this one." He enthused.

Gwen set her jaw and smacked him upside the head. "Dammit Hardison, you idiot." she almost growled at him.

Raising his hands to defend against any more hits he might have coming his way he looked at her confused. "What?"

"_I_ rob banks. For real. Why do you need a game for that?" Gwen demanded.

"Because you're crazy. I do _not _have a death wish. I'd much rather be your geeky tech guy who plays a game of thieves in his spare time." He answered her truthfully.

Gwen sighed as she stood up and opened the back door, jumping down onto the ground. "Okay. I understand." She said quietly.

"Gwen, I didn't mean it like that. I'm sorry." He called to her sincerely.

She nodded. "I know. I'm okay." She paused, looked up and him and smiled a little, " I'll see you bright and early Monday morning with all my tech equipment."

Before Hardison could answer she had disappeared into the night, leaving the door open.

He stood up and walked to it, looking around outside just in case Gwen was still out there. "Goodnight, Gwen." He said quietly, closing the doors and sitting down to a night of videos games.

Gwen sat on the rooftop of the next building over and watched Hardison close the van door. She smiled as he said goodnight and stood up heading home.


End file.
